


Blood for Blood

by Akiko_Natsuko



Series: Bloody76 Week [6]
Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Blood, Blood and Injury, Blood and Violence, Character Death, Death, Justice, M/M, Past Relationship(s), Revenge, Torture, Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-16
Updated: 2019-11-16
Packaged: 2021-01-31 12:37:23
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,154
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21446329
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Akiko_Natsuko/pseuds/Akiko_Natsuko
Summary: There was blood on his hands.That was nothing new. Jack’s hands had been stained with blood for years now.Some of it was blood he had spilt directly, some through inaction and more through his decisions, his choices, his inability to see what had been right under his nose.His inability to see the man on the floor for what he really was.
Relationships: Reaper | Gabriel Reyes/Soldier: 76 | Jack Morrison
Series: Bloody76 Week [6]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1518815
Comments: 2
Kudos: 36
Collections: Bloody 76 Week





	Blood for Blood

There was blood on his hands.

That was nothing new. Jack’s hands had been stained with blood for years now – the blood of the people he had failed to save, the bodies pulled from the rubble when they had got there too late to stop the Omnics. The blood of the agents who had died around him during the Crisis, and later under his command. The people who had died when Overwatch had failed to protect them both before and after the fall. The men, and women who had fallen with Zurich. And those that he had hunted in the aftermath. Some of it was blood he had spilt directly, some through inaction and more through his decisions, his choices, his inability to see what had been right under his nose.

His inability to see the man on the floor for what he really was.

_“Strike Commander Morrison.” Jack flinched at the title. It was something he had never wanted in the first place. He had been a soldier, not a bureaucrat. However, Gabriel had been the one who had pointed out that it wasn’t going to mean anything if they’d saved the world, just to let it fall apart again, or to let someone who hadn’t been out on the frontline and who knew what the Crisis had inflicted on the world to take over, and probably screw it up. Ana had agreed. So had the others, and so Jack had accepted it on the premise that it would just be until everyone was back on their feet again – Gabriel had smiled at that, something sad in his eyes. Apparently even back then he’d known that things weren’t going to be as simple as Jack wanted them to be, and not for the first time, Jack cursed him for not saying as much._

_“Director Petras,” Jack greeted, struggling to keep his voice neutral. He didn’t like this man. His policies, his demands, his way of looking at Jack as though he belonged to him. Yet wasn’t that the truth? With the world breathing down their neck, everyone had looked to Petras to rein Overwatch in – to rein him in, and as much as he wanted to slam the door in the man’s face as he knew that Gabriel would, he couldn’t. Not yet. Not while he might still be able to do some good, and so he stepped aside and let Petras inside._

“M-Morrison…”

There were no titles now. No illusion of congeniality or forced smiles and no masks. Jack had shed the visor and mask as soon as the apartment was locked down, not wanting or needing to hide any longer, and he stepped forward now. “Petras.” It was the only word he had said since he’d arrived. He wasn’t here to throw accusations. He didn’t need to. The truth had been written across the world’s media that morning, the files, the deals, the money trail – everything that he gathered over the last year and a half, bolstered by Sombra’s own investigations and packaged in her own inimitable style as it had been unleashed on the world.

It had all been there in black and white.

Petras had wanted war. He had wanted Overwatch to fall.

And for what?

Money.

_Was it worth it?_ The old Jack might have asked, unable to believe that anyone, even the man currently trying to crawl towards him, begging for mercy, would cause so much harm for money. Soldier 76 knew better, and besides, he already had the answer as he’d caught Petras in the middle of siphoning off what funds hadn’t already been blocked by the authorities or hacked by Sombra, who had sent them off to more deserving causes, the desk littered with escape plans. _It was all about the money. And the power._ Because Petras hadn’t been marred by the fall of Overwatch, he had been hailed as a champion for leading the investigation against them and eventually disbanding them under his own name. A hero. Someone who was protecting the world, from those who were supposed to have protected them. There was a cruel irony somewhere in that.

He glanced at his watch and the timer that Sombra had given him. The authorities would be here soon, the information they had passed on pointing an arrow directly at Petras, and the lockdown would have triggered an alarm, reducing his time further. That was fine. He didn’t need long for this, and he glanced down at Petras, meeting the dark eyes that had once looked at him as though he was no more than dirt on his shoes. Now, Jack was little more than the filth that he had once abhorred, knowing that there was no way back from the lines he’d crossed and the ones he would cross tonight, and Petras was staring at him with recognition. Not just for what he thought he was – a man raised from the dead, but with the heart-stopping terror of prey that knew it was going to die. Unfortunately, that only seemed to grease his tongue because he was babbling now, not pleas for mercy – at least he had the sense to realise that would get him nowhere, but threats of friends in high and low places, promises of money.

Jack didn’t grace him with a reply, glancing at the watch once more before stepping forward. _And what will you do when you find the truth, Jack? Reveal it? Let the authorities deal with it like they dealt with us?_ There was a snarl on his lips, half for the man trying to crawl away from him and half for the man in his memory, as he curled his fingers into the thinning, greying hair of the man who had destroyed everything. A snarl that became a growl as he hoisted Petras up, before slamming his head into the ground, the crack reverberating through the room and waking something in him.

_They were falling. Jack and Gabe. Gabe and Jack. It was strange how in the split second they’d had before the sounds of the first explosions ripping through the base, those months of tension and heated arguments, the surnames that had increased the distance between them had melted away. Jack wasn’t sure who had moved first, or who had shouted first, the words lost in the roar of the explosion that had torn through his office, the floor disappearing beneath their feet. All he knew was that they were falling, and when he reached out, fingers brushed against his just for a fleeting second, Gabriel reaching for him before something slammed into the other man. The crack surprisingly loud even with the cacophony around them, and then there was red, and Gabriel’s eyes were drifting, not shut, but not there as his hand fell away…_

It was Gabriel’s name on his lips as he smashed Petras’ head into the floor again. The crack was less satisfying this time, and he used more force the third time, rewarded with a wet, crunching sound as Petras gurgled out a scream of pain. The tiled floor had been pristine before, but now it was cracked, the cream expanse being painted with a slow, creeping web of red and for a moment, Jack was distracted by the sight.

_There was blood pooling around him, seeping amongst the rubble, a flash of colour in a world painted grey and brown as the remnants of his life crumbled around him, burying him beneath it. He knew that he should care about that, and about the numbness settling into every inch of his body, but he couldn’t. He was pinned, and whatever strength and will he might have had to try and escape had slipped away with the realisation that there had been no sign of Gabriel. Now, all he could do was blink, each one slower and heavier than the one before, watching as his life seeped out of him._

“I-if you hadn’t been so straight-laced, y-y-you could h-have joined us,” Petras was stammering and slurring, sounding almost drunk, and when Jack hauled him up, his gaze was unfocused. But the hate in his expression, marred only by his terror was as direct as a knife-edge. _Joined you?_ Jack thought about the news reports in the days that had followed Zurich, the images of what had been done to his home as fresh now as they had been back then. He thought of the lists – the dead, the missing, the accused. He thought of Gabriel’s name, top and centre of all three. He thought of his own. He thought of the spouses and children at the funerals that he had watched from a distance...

This time it was the ground that greeted Petras’ face, but his fist, the other man, howling as Jack smashed his already broken nose, splitting his lip further in the process. But Jack wasn’t done, half in the past and half in the present, as his grip shifted from the now bloody hair to Petras’ ear. Had Petras listened to those news reports? To the numbers of dead? Somehow Jack doubted it. But he had listened to them, over and over until they were imprinted on his memory, and he could hear them now, even over his own ragged breathing and Petras’s breathy, whimpering.

_“…the headquarters of Overwatch in Zurich…”_

_“….it isn’t known yet how many people have died, however, information obtained from Overwatch sources suggests that the base was not at full capacity at the time of the explosion…”_

_“……recovery efforts continue, with confirmed dead now over two hundred and with at least another hundred on the missing list, while authorities attempt to determine how many people were on the base at the time…”_

_“Blackwatch Commander Gabriel Reyes has been confirmed on the missing list, while it is believed that Strike Commander Jack Morrison who was facing charges in the coming weeks is believed dead…”_

Jack’s grip turned bruising, drawing a whimper from Petras. And it was the noise more than anything did it, as Jack twisted his hand and wrenched upwards. There was resistance, a pause, and then an awful grinding, ripping sound that was lost as Petras howled, lashing out at him. Jack barely felt the blow, but he let Petras fall, glancing at the bloody ear in his hand before tossing it away. Petras was trying to scuttle away, but Jack was faster, and he was on him before he had gone more than a few feet, a roaring sound in his ears as he repeated the treatment. _You wouldn’t listen,_ he thought, strangely dispassionate as he dropped the second ear on Petras’ chest as the former director lay in a pool of his own bloody, whimpering and cursing, eyes fluttering as though he was about to lose consciousness. “Not yet,” Jack smacked him hard across the cheek, feeling the bone snap beneath the force of his blow. It was a good sound, and he lashed out again, breaking the other one.

_ Reaper was above him, the bone mask even creepier this close, crimson burning deep in the eye sockets and there was something mesmerising about that malevolent gaze that stopped Jack from defending himself, as claws lashed out, opening his face. His blood warm against his skin. That had been a gentle tap compared to the second blow though, and Jack’s head snapped to the side, and he felt something shift in his cheek, a burning taking root beneath his skin for a moment before the SEP enhancements kicked in, his body already repairing itself. “Again,” he snarled, turning his head back to look at Reaper, goading him. “Aga…” The blow cut him off mid-word, splitting his lip open and filling his mouth with blood, but Reaper wasn’t done, hitting him again and again and again. Putting more and more force into each blow, until Jack dizzily wondered if maybe this was finally going to be it, and it took him a few seconds to realise that Reaper was speaking. A low mantra lost between the sound of the blows, and his own broken gunts._

_“It was all your fault. Damn you, Jack…it was all your fault.”_

He couldn’t bring himself to repeat those words, because, for all that Petras had done, Jack knew that he had been just as responsible. _We did this. _He pounded that message home with his fists,. Gabriel had taught him well, but it was his time as a vigilante, trawling through the underbelly of the world that had honed his skill. Pain was his goal here, and he knew just how to extract the maximum amount of pain. Of course, that was when Petras found a hint of a backbone, or sheer desperation took over, and he tried to fight back, flinging his arms up in a feeble shield as he tried to push him across the floor that was now slick with his own blood. A sharp stomp to his abdomen, had him wheezing and gasping, doubling up as his defiance crumbled, and another stomp saw his ankle shatter under the impact and Petras screamed, the sound fueling Jack’s fury.

The skin on his knuckles broke and healed, and broke again as he lashed out again and again. It had been a long time since he’d bothered to hold back his strength, something that he knew bothered Ana when she was him, but today, there was no holding back. Instead, he was pouring everything into each hit, revelling in the feel of skin bruising and breaking beneath him. Hands. Feet. There was no grace or restraint. He heard bones crack. First the other ankle, then a knee – Petras’ howl at that had been practically inhuman – then the ribs, cutting off that sound as Petras gasped for breath. Then the fingers on his left hand, the one that he had used to sign the Petras Act in front of the world’s media, and then his other hand, one bone at a time just because he could.

Petras wasn’t taking anymore. He wasn’t even crying out, his voice reduced to broken groans and whimpers, his breathing hitching with each blow, eyes rolling. A foul smell rising from him after Jack bore down with his all weight as he kicked him in the bladder. His lip curled in disgust, and he stomped down hard. Whatever had been there, and considering the first thing Petras had tried to do was buy his way out of this long-overdue meeting, it hadn’t been much, was crushed beneath his foot. The noise this time was inhuman, a thin, wavering shriek and Jack tilted his head, before grinding down again, Petras arching against the ground, blood and spittle flying from his mouth as he mouthed a plea.

Finally attempting to beg.

Jack let his weight rest there for a moment longer, savouring the pitiful attempt at pleading even as it disgusted him. Even now, Petras thought there was a way out of this, a way that he could survive. It was there in his eyes in the fleeting second their gazes met. _He expects to survive this._ The fury that followed that thought was unlike anything he’d felt since those first days when he had railed against his own survival when so many people had died. When he’d thought that Gabriel was dead. It was incandescent, bubbling up to a snarl, that became an animal growl as he reached down and hauled Petras up by the throat, dragging him out from under his foot, watching as the man’s eyes rolled in agony. His watch chiming in warning, even as he turned and headed for the doors that lead out onto the balcony, another perk of the penthouse paid for in the lives of his people.

There was blood on his hands, on his front, on his face. He could taste it on his lips as he wet them with his tongue, but he didn’t care. He didn’t mind this blood. _Blood for blood,_ he had told Ana that once, and seen the dismay in her face, the slow, dawning realisation that he wasn’t the man in her memory. She wouldn’t approve of this, it was why he hadn’t told her what he was doing, why he had ‘trusted’ no one but Sombra with this final step.

Perhaps Petras had realised his intent, had finally realised that Jack wasn’t the man who had bowed his head and looked the other way because he was clawing at the hand around his throat. A frantic, pitiful attempt to escape. He might as well have been trying to make the earth turn in the opposite direction for all the good it did, and Jack resisted the urge to tighten his fingers and crush him there and then, although he did squeeze in warning as Petras left scratches on already bloody hands. He used Petras’ body to smash the doors open, glass splintering over both of them, Petras jerking in his grip as the shards bit into his already bloody body.

The night air was almost a shock, a balm against the fire of his rage. Only it didn’t quench it; instead, it seemed to curl around him, containing that fury in all its incandescence and holding it in place, honed to perfection, no room for hesitation or mercy. The weaknesses of the man that Petras had held beneath his foot for so long.

Ten steps, The same amount of space that had been between him and Gabriel on that fateful day, and as Jack lifted Petras into the air, watching the man squirming and paling as he realised that the only thing between him and the drop to the ground some twenty stories below was the balcony, he felt the hair on the back of his neck stand on end. Something stirring in the air behind him. Jack didn’t turn, even as he heard the first heavy footstep. “Justice, Jack?” Reaper’s voice was a low growl, but it was deafening as even Petras had fallen silent, eyes darting between them, what spark od defiance he had been clinging to fading as he looked from Jack’s grim, blood-splattered features and the pristine, bone mask approaching behind them.

Jack smiled.

Death had come calling for both of them, and he saw the same realisation in Petras’ eyes as his mouth widened, one final attempt to beg for his life. “P…” Jack didn’t let him get past the first letter, hoisting him higher in the air, and meeting his gaze, still smiling.

Then he let go.

Petras was screaming, but Jack had already turned away. He didn’t need to see this bit. His part was done, as he turned to look at Reaper and the shotguns that were pointed directly at his heart, unwavering, waiting, and he closed his eyes, still smiling as he whispered his final reply.

“This hasn’t been about justice for a very long time…”


End file.
